Do Fish See Like We Do?

John Cox

August 1, 2019
by Cody Kelley

It’s no big secret that bass need to find food in order to survive. Like all other predatory animals they use all of their senses to help them do this. One of the obvious sets of tools for doing this is located on each side of their head. That’s right … their eyes.

So if fish have eyes, that must mean that they see things like we do, right? Well, not exactly.

Just think about how blurry things are underwater for us if we don’t wear goggles. It would be pretty tough to see food underwater. It’d be tough if you had to hunt with vision that bad, right? Well, here is how fish eyes are made and how they help fish find food.

One of the first things you might notice is different about a fish’s eye is that it has no eyelid like we do. That would be pretty weird to see a fish blink! Normally, an eyelid protects and wets the eye. Fish don’t have any worries about keeping their eyes wet after all.

Unlike us, fish don’t need to wear goggles in order to see clearly. This is because the eye of a fish is actually completely different than ours. A fish eye is more “spherical” than ours and helps take in the waves of light underwater in a way that makes them clear. Just like our vision is blurry underwater, a fish would have blurry vision above water because the light waves would be entering their eye differently.

So do fish see color? Well, let’s hope so! Or else a lot of fishermen have spent a lot of time and money worrying about nothing.

Fish do, in fact, see colors. However, they don’t all see them the same way that we do. While fish see several different colors, it is believed that they can see the most shades of green and red. Think about all the different fishing lures that are a shade of green.

This doesn’t always hold true for every fish out there. Some saltwater fish can see shades of blues better, and it is believed that sharks are completely color blind (but I’m not going to get close enough to ask one).

There is a lot more to the science behind exactly how fish see things differently than we do. These small facts should be a good start to get you thinking about how a fish’s vision might affect how you choose your next lure.

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